The proliferation and increased usage of portable computer and electronic devices has greatly increased demand for memory cells. Digital cameras, digital audio players, personal digital assistants, and the like generally seek to employ large capacity memory cells (e.g., flash memory, smart media, compact flash, or the like). Memory cells can be typically employed in various types of storage devices. Storage devices include long term storage mediums such as, for example, hard disk drives, compact disk drives and corresponding media, digital video disk (DVD) drives, and the like. The long-term storage mediums typically store larger amounts of information at a lower cost, but are slower than other types of storage devices. Storage devices also include memory devices, which are often, but not always, short-term storage mediums.
Because of the increasing demand for information storage, memory device developers and manufacturers are constantly attempting to increase speed and storage retrieval for memory devices (e.g. increase write/read speed). At the same time, to reach high storage densities, manufacturers typically focus on scaling down semiconductor device dimensions (e.g., at sub-micron levels). Nonetheless, formation of various transistor type control devices that are typically required for programming memory cell arrays increase costs and reduce efficiency of circuit design. Additionally, memory cell retention can often be limited by constraints placed on memory cell density and/or speed.
Therefore, a need exists in the art for systems and methods that surmount the aforementioned deficiencies associated with conventional devices.